Kill them with Connectivity

Thomas PM Barnett (Pentagon's New Map, Blueprint For Action, see link on the side) said that the way to erode a statist government is through connectivity. We saw a huge example of this when the Soviet Union fell - faxes, satellite TV and early email provided singnificant (and instant!) communication for those behind the Iron Curtain. It wasn't long before the USSR fell and most of it's client states collapsed. Sure, there was/is lots of rubble, like the mess the Germans incorporating the anemic East German economy, but the West won the Cold War without having T72s vs M1s in the Fulda Gap.

Yesterday, 2 ships from the Chinese Navy docked at Naval Station San Diego (32nd Street). The sailors are doing the usual tourist stuff (San Diego zoo), but they're also visiting the base Exchange and Commissary. Can you imagine what it must be like for a peasant from the hinterlands of China, serving as a junior enlisted man seeing an Exchange or Commissary? Seeing men & women in uniform, all ranks, all shopping at the same place. The parking lot filled with the cars of all of these sailors! Even the juniorest (is that a word?) of sailors has a car. If this is how sailors live, can you imagine how the rest of America lives? Now, imagine the message they take back to their families.

If we want Castro to collapse, we should open the floodgates of trade. Let his people see how Americans live.

And, if we want Iranians to choose a government that is pro-Western, we should connect as much as we can at the lowest levels. Spread the word of American dynamism, growth and freedom. Teach the Iranian people about the U.S. Bring an Iranian military delegation to Fort Irwin and put on a dog and pony show to show them the might of the US Army - and the vastness of the Fort Irwin PX.